Mad World
by sajere1
Summary: He walks through the halls and swears nobody sees him. Oneshot songfic


_All around me are familiar faces_

_Worn out places_

_Worn out faces_

_Bright and early for their daily races_

_Going nowhere_

_Going nowhere_

He walks through the halls and swears nobody sees him.

His coal-colored eyebrows inch towards each other, the crease they create splitting his forehead in two; his chapped lips are pursed and his hair, gritty and unwashed, hangs in his dark green eyes. His shoulders are hunched as he walks, the backpack he wears blocking them out as he thinks. What he thinks of, only one person can be sure now, and that person isn't even a real person; it's an animal of sorts. He's learned to call it a Digimon, or more specifically, Armadillomon. It _always_ knows what the boy is thinking, because that's what it exists for. Mentally, he doesn't count it.

He stops at a locker twice his size, rusted all around; the tiny girl next to him is struggling to grab her book from one of her shelves. He grabs it and hands it to her, and the blood rushes to her face. She grabs it and mumbles a hasty apology before quickly leaving, and it is as if they never spoke at all. As if he hadn't been kind, as if she hadn't been embarrassed to need help. This is the closest he ever gets to recognition.

The faces around him are tired, more tired than elementary students should look. Purple bags sag beneath most of their eyes, which more than a few small hands still rub the sleep out of. Nobody likes school here. Everyone is so worried about fitting in that they don't bother to include everyone else, and everyone is so tired from all the work that there is no chance to make good friends. Sometimes he thinks of it as a prison cell. He feels guilty for having the DigiEgg of Knowledge.

_And their tears are filling up their glasses_

_No expression_

_No expression_

_Hide my head I want to drown my sorrow_

_No tomorrow_

_No tomorrow_

Across the hall, a third-grader is crying; a fifth-grader has stolen her lunch and she has no idea what she's going to eat. He bows his head and pretends not to hear. His eyebrows smooth, his lips relax, and his eyes lose their brooding. He is expressionless, one amongst many uncaring children, one of the large group who pretends not to feel.

Everyone is invisible here.

He hangs his book bag up with some difficulty, grabbing his binder and the books he needs before lunch. The stack towers above him, an ominous thickness about it; he teeters precariously, trying as hard as he can not to fall. His arm, itchy in its blue sweater, bumps into the cold, unforgiving wall, and he loses the dictionary at the top. He sighs and reaches down to grab it.

"Iori?"

_And I find it kind of funny_

_I find it kind of sad_

_The dreams in which I'm dying_

_Are the best I've ever had_

_I find it hard to tell you_

'_Cause I find it hard to take_

_When people run in circles_

_It's a very, very mad world_

He looks up sharply at the voice and there, in front of him, is a familiar blonde, his white hat perched on his head, giving him a grin like no tomorrow. He freezes in shock before a teacher's door opens and a draft comes out, and the image is blown away with the wind. He blinks before grimacing and reaching for the book. _I'm _not _insane. I'm not._

He has to wonder, walking down the hall, how many Takeru's have died today? Five? Fifty? Five-hundred? How many people are gone? How many by choice? How many that are the center of someone else's world, who willingly destroy the person in order to escape life?

Selfish. Takeru is so, so selfish in death. But he can't bring himself to hate the boy. He can never hate Takeru, no matter what he does. People say he's _intelligent._

He needs to make new friends.

_Children waiting for the day they feel good_

_Happy birthday_

_Happy birthday_

_Made to feel the way that every child should_

_Sit and listen_

_Sit and listen_

Walking into the room, he finds that almost the entirety of his class is gathered around one, beaming girl, proudly bearing a 'Happy Birthday!' button on her shirt. She is finally as every small child expects to feel – proud, gleeful, surrounded by friends who care about her. He wants to scream. _They_ don't care about her. _They're _not Takeru.

Takeru, the pensive dead man…

"Why don't you go congratulate her, Iori?" a voice whispers in his ear, but when he turns nobody is there. He grits his teeth and turns to sit as far away as possible. Nobody notices – everyone is invisible, after all.

The teacher stands and clears her throat, calling for order just as the bell rings and her pupils scramble to take their seats. He boredly looks out the window as the class sing Happy Birthday loudly and off-key, and on the sidewalk far below he sees the blonde again, grinning up at him and waving before crumbling into nothing.

_Went to school and I was very nervous_

_No one knew me_

_No one knew me_

_Hello teacher tell me what's my lesson_

_Look right through me_

_Look right through me_

The lesson begins – _finally _– and it is only about angles, something he has known about for years already. In some way, though, he is glad that it is so monotonous, something so routine; anything to get his mind off of these…these _things._ They're not hallucinations – not really – because a hallucination means that the person thinks they're _real_, doesn't it? He knows these aren't real. So they're not quite hallucinations. He doesn't know what to call them. The only person who might know is Koushiro, and he's too scared that the older boy will cart him off to an asylum.

The teacher's eyes ghost past him as she speaks, as if he is not even there, like he doesn't exist. Maybe he _doesn't _exist. How do you tell? Does a hallucination think it's real? Is he just the product of someone's overactive imagination? Does it really matter, when you think about it?

He wonders, if he's imaginary and he thinks he's real, does that mean that the Takeru he imagines is real, too?

Maybe he is insane. Nobody here would care either way. They don't know him. He is nothing.

_And I find it kind of funny_

_I find it kind of sad_

_The dreams in which I'm dying_

_Are the best I've ever had_

"I'll be around as long as you need me. I promise." He buries his face in his hand, body shaking – whether in laughter or tears, he cannot be sure. Takeru is dead, he knows, just as dead as he was when he was found, splattered beneath the building from which he had jumped, as dead as he had been beneath the casket as they buried him permanently. He knows that Takeru's gone, that they'll never speak again, that he'll never again be reassured by the older boy.

Is it wrong, then, that he _enjoys_ this thing his subconscious has cooked up? Is it bad that it gives him comfort – the _only_ thing that can give him comfort? Is it wrong that he likes being a psychopath?

He tries to pretend that his best friend isn't dead for a moment.

_I find it hard to tell you_

'_Cause I find it hard to take_

_When people run in circles_

_It's a very, very mad world_

He ponders, for a moment. Maybe the rest of the world is insane and he is the only sane one…though, by definition, wouldn't that make being insane sane and sane insane, therefore making him insane? Does that make any amount of sense? He's not sure. But the world is chasing its own tail and he's sick of being part of it.

He falls slowly to the ground, crashing face-first, chest heaving and tears in his eyes. The scratchy carpet leaves red marks on his arms.

Still, nobody notices him.

_Enlargen your world_

_Mad world._

+x+

My best friend tried to commit suicide at the same moment I found this song, so it seemed appropriate.


End file.
